Rallying Cry

The opposition to the Truman Doctrine was vehement. It came from isolationists like the New York Daily News, from pacifists like the National Council for Prevention of War, from Russophiles like Senator Claude Pepper, from liberals like Fiorello LaGuardia, who would feed the starving of Greece but leave Greece's Communist troubles to U.N. It came from such Red outposts as the Daily Worker and the National Council of American-Soviet Friendship. But for all its vehemence it was scattered. No one man had yet sounded the cry around which all factions could rally.

This week one man tried. Henry Wallace spoke at Madison Square Garden.

Normal Conflict. "The world cries out," he cried, "not for an American crusade in the name of hatred and fear of Communism, but for a world crusade in the name of the brotherhood of man. . . .

"The truth is that the President and his Republican backers are less concerned with the need of the Greek people for food than with the need of the American Navy for oil. The plan to contain Communism is second to that need. . . .

"I shall not blame America alone for present tensions and I shall criticize Russia when I think Russia is wrong. But I do assert that a great part of our conflict with Russia is the normal conflict between two strong and sovereign nations and can be solved in normal ways. . .."

Senator's Amen. "The Administration and its Republican supporters argue that we must intervene alone in Greece because the United Nations is too weak to act. I have not forgotten the appeasement of Hitler. I remember that every betrayal of world solidarity against Hitler by Daladier and Chamberlain was made in the name of the weakness of the League of Nations.

"If the United Nations is weak, who makes it weak? Who was it who insisted on keeping the budget of the United Nations six million dollars lower than the amount spent to keep the streets of New York City clean? The Soviet Government certainly wished to keep the budget low. Speaking in the name of a stingy-minded Republican Congress, Senator Vandenberg cried, Amen. . . ."

The World v. the U.S. "We ask that the United Nations face the problem of security not piecemeal but on a worldwide basis. This means the internationalization of the Dardanelles, the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal. It means world disarmament and world control of atomic energy.

"Sooner or later Truman's program of unconditional aid to anti-Soviet governments will unite the world against America and divide America against herself. Once we grant unconditional loans to the undemocratic governments of Greece and Turkey, then, in the name of freedom, every fascist dictator will know that he has credit in our bank.

"Hatred and violence abroad, hatred and fear at home will be the fruits of the Truman Doctrine. A strong United Nations can bring peace."

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